


The Adventure Of The Abbey Grange (1897)

by Cerdic519



Series: Elementary 221B [164]
Category: Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms, Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Detectives, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Cock Rings, Destiel - Freeform, F/M, Illegitimacy, Inheritance, Johnlock - Freeform, M/M, Monks, Murder, Poisoning, Religion
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-15
Updated: 2017-07-15
Packaged: 2018-12-02 11:40:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,218
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11508675
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cerdic519/pseuds/Cerdic519
Summary: Sherlock and John return to Berkshire, this time to a small town left behind by the nineteenth century – except when it comes to murder, apparently.





	The Adventure Of The Abbey Grange (1897)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [supersockie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/supersockie/gifts).



One of the things that I found puzzling about my blue-eyed genius lover was that he was sometimes strangely uncertain, especially bearing in mind some of our experiments in and out of the bedroom. I had come to the conclusion he seemed to have a nagging worry that I might start to find him boring if he did not keep me on my toes, and might actually seek comfort elsewhere. Frankly there was more likelihood of the Moon deciding to leave Earth and start orbiting Mars for a change! I loved the man more than life itself, and I would never, ever leave him.

On this particular day, however, I really wanted to kill him!

+~+~+

The day had started well enough. At least the first two or three seconds, after which my senses had kicked in and I had realized that I was tied face down to the bed, my morning wood rubbing fruitlessly against the sheets. And Sherlock was sat kneeling between my pinioned legs, slowly preparing me for what was to come. Me, with any luck.

Sherlock's desire to keep me interested in sex (really, there was no need, but the effort seemed to make him happy, so I graciously allowed it) had led the previous evening to me dressing up as in the Roman gladiator costume, with leather cuffs around my wrists and ankles, a leather harness across my chest and what turned out to be a detachable leather skirt. There was no sword, but with Sherlock impaling me three times in rapid succession, I had not needed (another) one. I must have passed out after the third time, for my last memory had been of his clambering over my back and kissing me to sleep.

And my still half-asleep brain now realized that the small loops in the four cuffs were to enable them to be tied to something, in this case the bedposts. Sherlock had detached the skirt but had left the harness on, and the metal ring in the centre felt cold against my bare chest. I squirmed around in vain, and he chucked darkly. 

“My perfect fighter”, he praised. “John, possibly from the Hebrew Yohanan, meaning 'God is gracious'. And in those forest-green eyes and bowed legs of yours, my perfect mate, I see the Lord's finest work.”

I blushed at his words. He knew that I did not take praise easily, and it was most unfair of him to do this whilst I was not in a position to object. Or a position to do anything, much. 

He gently scissored me open, kissing around the harness on my back up to the thin leather collar. Before putting it on he had shown me the engraving inside that stated 'Property of Sherlockus Castiellus' and, as always, offered me the chance to refuse. As if! This man owned me more fully than any of those long-vanished Romans had ever owned their slaves.

I felt the gentle pressure of his cock-head at my entrance, and braced myself. But nothing happened. I turned my head, trying to send him a sideways glare.

“Sherlock!” I moaned.

“Do you really want this?” he teased. “Or should I just drive you to the edge, then leave you there?”

My eyes widened. Part of me was horrified at the thought, whilst another part – mostly the one achingly hard against the sheets that could probably have smashed its way through a brick just then – was very keen indeed. He chuckled darkly.

“I am going to fuck you until you are ready to come, John”, he said casually, as he slipped a cock-ring onto me but did not yet close it. “Then I am going to leave the harness on you, and you are going to wear it beneath your normal clothes all day.”

I gulped.

“This ring is actually designed to break if you get too hard”, he chuckled, and I could hear the smirk in his voice. “But if you can keep it intact all day, there will be a... reward tonight.”

He slipped into me and began to pound my prostate mercilessly. I let out an angry growl, and resolved that I could do this. Hell, a quiet day in Baker Street working on my writings, and all I would have to do would be to ignore Sherlock trying to provoke me. I could do that.

I came violently into the sheets, and he followed me almost immediately, slumping down inelegantly on top of my trapped body. Yes, I could do this. I was sure that I could do this.

Probably sure.

+~+~+

Which brought me to right now, where I wanted to kill the blue-eyed genius. Barely thirty minutes after we had emerged from his bedroom, the leather chafing beneath my clothes and the ring all too tight, Sherlock had told me that he had a new case. I knew immediately that this must have been the telegram that had arrived late the previous night, which meant that the bastard had planned this torture all along. Even worse, the case demanded Sherlock's immediate presence in west Berkshire, over an hour's bumpy train-ride from London. Yes, I was going to have to kill him.

If the bloody train journey didn't kill me first!

+~+~+

That journey was not helped by the fact that, even though it was June and summer was only a couple of weeks away, the country was beset by strong winds, and the train was rocking somewhat alarmingly as it rattled its way through the Berkshire countryside. We were on our way to the small market town of Stevedon at the request of a local police officer, the wonderfully-named Sergeant Wilberforce Rhynes Chevalier. The crime that he had asked us to come and investigate was a strange one indeed.

“Why would anyone want to poison an abbey full of monks?” I mused, as I read through Bradshaw's short piece on the town. “It is surely a crime without motive.”

Sherlock looked at me hungrily, and I was sure that I felt the metal around my cock groan under the strain. It was going to be a long, hard day.

“There is always the possibility that we are dealing with a madman”, Sherlock admitted, looking pointedly southwards and smiling slightly, “but few crimes are truly without motive. And even to the madman, his actions usually make some sort of sense.”

“But monks!” I said. “Really?”

“Is there anything of interest about the place in “Bradshaw”?” he asked.

“A bit”, I said. “Stevedon was a Saxon town, acquired a castle under the Normans, and had a minster church that evolved into an abbey. It remained important until it fell foul of that blackguard Henry the Eighth, the abbey being sold to one of his followers who mostly knocked it down and rebuilt it as the Abbey Grange. It was next purchased by Henry Earl of Warminster, who entertained Good Queen Bess there, but his great-grandson the Catholic Earl Arthur fled with James the Second in sixteen hundred and eighty-eight, and it passed to some Protestant cousins of theirs, the Horsingtons, who have held it ever since. About twenty years the current Lord Horsington, the first Catholic to hold that title in over three centuries, gave some of the old outbuildings to an order of monks, who have set up a new abbey there.”

“And the town?” Sherlock asked.

“Gone downhill since”, I said. “Lost its castle in the Civil Wars and managed to get sacked by both the Roundheads and the Cavaliers, got sacked again in the Glorious Revolution by the Dutch, was by-passed by the Great West Road, and then refused to let the railway through when it arrived fifty years or so back. Brunel went via Swindon instead, and Stevedon became a backwater.”

+~+~+

When we finally reached the small town however, I wondered if it had chosen that badly in denying the top-hatted engineer. Its isolation had left it a quiet place, redolent of an England which seemed to belong to another age. I had grown up next to the railway in Northumberland, but from the many times that I had walked over to Bamburgh, I had seen what a difference it made when 'progress' did or did not come through. Had Stevedon chosen well, or ill? It was hard to say.

I had visualized the Abbey Grange as being out in the country, away from the town itself, so it came as something of a surprise to find that it was quite the opposite. A frankly unimpressive archway leading away from the High Street between the Tar & Feathers Inn and a solicitor’s office led to a second archway, beyond which we found ourselves in some sort of stable-yard. A smartly-dressed fellow in his forties, wearing a tweed suit that looked as if it had seen better days, approached us at once. He looked decidedly unwelcoming.

“Greetings, sirs”, he said tersely. “You are aware that this is private property?”

His tone very much implied that he hoped we had not been. 

“We are here to see Sergeant Chevalier”, Sherlock said politely. “At the new Abbey. We were led to understand that this is the way in?”

The man looked at us thoughtfully.

“This is the back entrance, sirs”, he said. “This ground is the property of Stevedon Abbey, but the Grange owner has right of passage across it. The main entrance to the big house is off West Street.”

“As we are here over a small matter of the majority of the brothers being poisoned, it is clearly the Abbot that we need to see”, Sherlock said. “Who are _you_ , sir?”

His tone was not rude, but it was as dry and unwelcoming as the one in which we ourselves had been addressed. Our inquisitor seemed surprised to have his attitude thrown back at him.

“Mr. Sirius Furness, sirs”, he said. “Estate-manager to Lord Horsington, owner of the Grange. The Abbey entrance is that blue door, over there.”

Sherlock nodded his thanks, and we left the fellow standing in the middle of the yard. A knock at the door, and we were admitted into the old building, where we found the Father Abbot and Sergeant Chevalier waiting for us. 

The Abbot was a small elderly fellow, seemingly worn down by his many years in office, whilst the sergeant was the opposite, a tall, muscular man of about thirty-five years of age, who seemed to fill the room with his sheer bulk. The thought crossed my mind that he would have been better fitted to being a crusading knight of old rather than a country policeman. When he spoke however, it was with the typical slow Wiltshire accent.

“We both appreciate you coming down, sirs”, he said. “This may be something and nothing, but that fact that it happened where it did has got people talking. We would both like it cleared up as soon as possible.”

“You were a little vague in your letter, sergeant”, Sherlock said. “Although I must say, the idea of an ‘accidental mass poisoning’ did..... arouse my curiosity.”

(I really wished that he had not used the word 'arouse'. Nor have smiled knowingly at me when he said it. It made things hard.....er. And in the presence of a man of God!)

“I must thank you for coming”, the Abbot said, mercifully unaware of my sufferings. “My name is Dunstan, and I am father to the seventeen brothers in this establishment. I only hope that you can establish what did happen, as the sergeant here is fearful that it may be a precursor to something worse.”

Sherlock and I both looked at the sergeant curiously.

“Policeman’s instinct”, he said shortly. “Something about this smells, and it’s not just the sage and onions!”

“We seem to be getting ahead of ourselves”, Sherlock smiled. “Let us start at the beginning.”

+~+~+

A brother brought us the traditional bread and wine, and Father Abbot waited until he had gone before commencing.

“It was on Friday”, he began. “It was a perfectly normal day until the drama that befell us at dinner that evening. There was fish, of course, and potatoes served with herbs. Dinner was barely finished however before all the brothers in the dining hall started feeling very ill. The town physician, Dr. Storrington, was called, and he quickly established that they had all been poisoned.”

“Poisoned?” I asked. He nodded.

“Belladonna, or deadly nightshade”, he said. “Some had apparently sprouted amongst the herbs, and had been picked in error. Unfortunately Brother Demetrius, who normally supervises the herbarium, has been ill of late, so his replacement must have been careless.”

“Were there any casualties?” Sherlock asked. The Abbot shook his head.

“Mercifully none”, he said. “Three of the brothers were worse than the rest, and Brother Honorius was very sick, but they all survived, thanks be to God. It seemed like a tragic error.”

“I am not inclined to believe that it was an error”, Sergeant Chevalier said firmly, “tragic or otherwise. I spoke to the two young brothers who picked the herbs, and they were both adamant that there was only sage in their baskets. I have looked at both plants, and there are definite differences between them.”

I rather liked this policeman. He definitely seemed to know what was what.

“I suppose that it is possible the two would not wish to incriminate themselves”, Sherlock mused. “Still, let us assume for a moment that you are right, and that this was deliberate. Was everyone poisoned?”

“Except for three of us”, the Abbot said. “Myself – I was dining at the Grange that evening. Brother Richard, the prior, who was working on some documents in the town library, and had ordered sandwiches for his return as he did not know how long he would be absent. And the cook himself, Brother Michael, who always eats after everybody else.”

Sherlock nodded.

“Please tell me about the Grange”, he said.

“It has been in the Horsington family ever since the Revolution of 1688”, Sergeant Chevalier said. “Lord Giles is the current holder and, I am sorry to say, and is not in the best of health. We had thought that he was the last of the line, but last year he found a distant cousin, a Mr. Alexander Hill, who is now his heir. That proved to be important as things stood, because back in 1704 the then Lord Horsington wrote into his will that the Church would get the lands back if the family’s male line ever failed. The current Lord, being of the old faith, changed the wording to the Catholic Church, of course. That outcome looked quite likely until the sudden advent of Mr. Hill.”

The Abbot blushed.

“The family has been very generous”, he said defensively. “These buildings were the old outhouses and stables to the Grange, but when Lord Giles inherited, his first act was to gift them back to the Holy Church.”

I noted the use of the word ‘back’. Interesting.

“How has Lord Giles responded to the incident?” Sherlock asked.

“He sent his own doctor down to help”, the Abbot said. “He could not have been more helpful.”

I was sure that I could hear the implied ‘and so he should have been’ in there somewhere. Sherlock stared warningly at me, and I blushed.

+~+~+

Sherlock decided that he first wished to see the herb-garden from which the deadly dinner had been gathered, and we were shown there by Brother Joseph, Brother Demetrius’ main replacement during the latter’s indisposition. My friend questioned young monk closely on various herbs around the small enclosed garden, but he seemed to know what he was talking about. Certainly much more than I did, though that was probably not saying much. Belladonna was grown in the garden for medicinal purposes, but Brother Joseph showed us that it was kept in an isolated part of the garden, to which only Brother Honorius, the herbalist, ever ventured. All the other monks knew well that even touching some of the herbs grown therein could bring illness or even death, and there was a sign warning about the need for gloves on the gate in. 

We decided to adjourn to the Coach & Horses, the other major tavern in the High Street, for lunch. Sherlock's smirk at my obvious discomfort was not helping matters, and I went to the toilets to adjust myself a little. His quirked eyebrow on my return was just asking for it. 

Sergeant Chevalier joined us just as we were finishing, but declined a drink as he was on duty.

“I could not say as much in front of the Abbot”, he said, “but I do not like his prior, Brother Richard. Although I do not see any motive for his attempting to kill an entire abbey full of his own brothers!”

“Let us start by restricting ourselves to facts”, Sherlock said. “No-one has died. That may have been the intention all along.”

“Someone wanted to make a abbey full of holy men fall sick?” I said dubiously.

“Tell me about the people at the Grange”, Sherlock said. “In particular, which faith they follow.”

The sergeant seemed surprised at that question, but duly answered.

“Well, Lord Giles is about as Catholic as they come!” the he said firmly. “As I said, he was able to change the original wording which left everything to 'the Church'; I believe that he spent a lot of money on lawyers to make it all sound, just in case anyone had the idea of challenging it once he's gone. He pays for masses and everything. Until this distant relative rolled up, I believe he would have been perfectly happy to have the lands returned to the Abbey on his death. But Mr. Hill’s advent has changed all that. Blood trumps faith, I suppose.”

“It is rather strange”, Sherlock mused. “And timely. With the succession unclear, the abbey could have inherited, and possession is an important factor in the law. What is this Mr. Hill like?”

“He is a foreigner”, the sergeant said, sounding openly distrustful. “Two of Lord Giles’ cousins - well, first cousins once removed - went over to Australia some years ago, and he is the one that came back. The other one got shot over a claim on a gold-mine; he was injured in the same attack, but survived. He is Church of England, but not overly religious. There have been rumours that Lord Giles wished him to convert, although he could not make his inheriting the estate dependent on that. I think Mr. Hill might go along with it anyway, though.”

“We were fortunate enough to meet the estate-manager earlier”, I said dryly. “He was not exactly welcoming.”

“Mr. Sirius Furness depends on Lord Giles for his job”, the sergeant said. “It is said that he and Mr. Hill do not see eye to eye over the future of the estate. I very much suspect that he will be looking for alternative employment when Lord Giles passes.”

“And Mr. Furness is Church of England?”

“He is”, the sergeant confirmed. “Very High Church. That is yet another point of tension between him and Mr. Hill.”

“It is all very odd”, Sherlock said. “We have a crime committed without any apparent motive, and in the wrong place.”

“The wrong place?” I asked.

“If there were a poisoning at the Abbey Grange, I could understand it”, Sherlock said. “But in the Abbey itself – it makes no sense.”

His words were to prove horribly prophetic.

+~+~+

Sherlock, the bastard, spent the whole return journey teasing me, so much that when we finally made it to Paddington, I could barely walk along the platform with my erection. But I had made it thus far, and I was determined to succeed. I was so near to my 'reward'!

Except I had forgotten that we still had a bumpy cab ride back to Baker Street. That and Sherlock's constant possessive growl proved my undoing, and almost within sight of the the house, I felt a sudden wetness across my chest and down my legs (Sherlock had insisted that I don no underwear, the bastard). I actually cried in disappointment, to the almost certain puzzlement of the cab-driver.

“So close”, he muttered. “Never mind. Perhaps I can offer you a small consolation prize.”

I perked up – at least until I discovered that he had been talking quite literally. There was a large apple-pie which he had ordered in, and he cut me the tiniest slice imaginable before helping himself to a large piece, and eating it right there in front of me! And as usual, my pouting had no effect on him. Life was unfair!

All right, he did let me eat the rest of the pie later, but that is beside the point.

+~+~+

Exactly one week later, Sherlock and I were once more on our way to Stevedon. There had been a second poisoning, this time at the Abbey Grange itself, just as my friend had foretold. And this time, someone had died.

+~+~+

The poisoning had happened on a Wednesday, and Sergeant Chevalier had requested our presence as soon as possible. Sherlock had surprised me by responding that we were currently finishing a case (we were not) and could not come immediately, but that he promised to come down on the first train on Friday morning, which we were now on. He had used the intervening Thursday to do some research into the Horsingtons, to what end I did not know. Now however we were on our way, the train thankfully rather smoother than the week before. And I had no 'distractions' to torture me – well, apart from the usual blue-eyed light of my life.

We met Sergeant Chevalier at Uffington Station, and he took us directly to the Abbey Grange and the study of Lord Giles. The nobleman, wrapped as he was in copious blankets on his couch, was clearly in shock.

“This is terrible!”, he muttered. “And it is all my fault!”

“How so, sir?” Sherlock asked plainly. The nobleman looked at him.

“Last week”, he said, in a tone little more than a whisper. “I received an anonymous letter from Australia. The sender claimed that the man calling himself Mr. Alexander Hill was, in fact, an impostor. My cousins were both killed in the argument over that mine, and Mr. Hill was the one that killed them, before assuming one of their identities and coming to England.”

“What did you do with the letter?” Sherlock asked.

“I threw it into the fire, of course!” the nobleman said angrily. “Scurrilous nonsense! But I kept wondering….. so when I went to confession with Prior Richard on Wednesday, I told all to him. He asked me how I felt about it, and I…I….”

He stopped, looking totally wretched.

“You did what?” Sherlock prompted.

“I asked God to send me a sign!” the nobleman said. “And at dinner that same evening, my cousin – or whoever he was – was poisoned!”

I had to suppress a laugh when I caught Sergeant Chevalier's face behind the nobleman. It very clearly said 'God give me strength!'. 

We managed to extricate ourselves from the blabbering nobleman, and the sergeant took us into the dining-room where the poisoning had happened. There was a massive portrait of a smartly-dressed nobleman from the last century hanging on the wall, seemingly staring down disapprovingly at us all as if we were Lowering The Tone Of Their Abode.

“Edwin, the Lord Horsington who inherited the estate after the Glorious Revolution”, the sergeant explained. “And the one who made the original Church bequest; he had a narrow escape in a hunting accident that led him to do that, so they say. He was a bit of an eccentric, but then that's the English nobility for you. I suppose that having fathered six legitimate sons and even more on the wrong side of the blanket, he thought the line was secure.”

Sherlock looked at him quizzically.

“You seem highly conversant with the family history”, he observed.

“You have to know the important folks round here, so you don't tread on any toes”, the sergeant said levelly. “You seem to find that portrait interesting, sir.”

“I do”, Sherlock said. “You mentioned those born on the wrong side of the blanket, as you call them. Would not they be barred from inheriting?”

“Not if all the legitimate lines were exhausted”, the sergeant said. “That was why I mentioned them; doubtless old Lord Edwin saw them as 'back-up'. I have to say it looks as if the Catholic Church will get its land back after all – unless another heir pops up out of nowhere!”

“Or someone pretending to be such”, Sherlock said. “Let us return to Wednesday night. What was the precise sequence of events, please?”

The sergeant flipped open his notebook.

“Lord Giles spent the afternoon reading in his room”, he said. “Prior Richard visited him shortly after four, bringing a herbal rub, as well as some supplies for the kitchen....”

“Supplies?” Sherlock cut in.

“His Lordship obtained his herbs and spices, as well as some vegetables, from the Abbey”, the sergeant said. “It was part of the deal for them having the land; a sort of rent, I suppose. That, according to the local doctor, was what got Mr. Hill. The meal that night was roast beef with potatoes and vegetables, and the sage that the cook used must have been from the same batch that poisoned the monks the week before. Damn and blast, I should have remembered that some might have found its way up here!”

“Was not His Lordship poisoned?” I asked.

“He ate little that night, and he did feel poorly afterwards, but nothing serious. He was still distracted from his conversation with Prior Richard earlier.”

“And no-one else came to or left the house that day?” Sherlock asked.

“His Lordship did go out for a walk before dinner”, the sergeant said. “It was when Mr. Hill came back from a visit to Swindon; he said he wished to avoid talking to him, given what he had just read. He said that he went over Fairlee Woods way.”

Sherlock smiled.

“That is important”, he said firmly. “The doctor and I have some calls to make in the town in connection with our inquiries, but I see a definite set of possibilities here. If all goes well, you may have your town jail occupied by the end of the day, sir. Though I suspect you will be surprised at who is in it!”

+~+~+

Our first call was to Doctor Charles Storrington, who had examined the body after the death. The man seemed more than a little wary of us.

“Are you doubting my findings, gentlemen?” he inquired, somewhat testily.

“Not at all”, Sherlock said smoothly. “I do have two questions, however, which may help me to solve this matter. First, what alcohol did Mr. Hill imbibe shortly before dying?”

“His Lordship served a rich red wine from Spain with dinner”, the doctor said. “He provided me with the decanter which I of course had tested. It was negative. The only poison was in the herbs. I am sorry.”

“Indeed, that is what I hoped you would say”, Sherlock said, to the man's evident mystification. “My second question is more personal, and I will understand if you feel unable to answer it. For how long has Lord Giles suffered from his heart condition?”

The doctor stared at him in surprise.

“He told you about it?” he asked dubiously.

“No”, Sherlock said. “It is my business to know things, usually things people would rather that I did not know. I merely wished for you to confirm my suspicions. Thank you for your time, doctor.”

He ushered me out of the room. I turned to him.

“How did you know that Lord Giles had a heart condition?” I asked. “I would have needed an examination to confirm that. Or do you think that someone may try to poison him next?”

“My thoughts are not directed in that direction”, Sherlock smiled. “Though his condition may become all too relevant if one of our next ports of call yields the result that I expect.”

As well as its two taverns, Stevedon's high street had two restaurants, but Sherlock apparently did not find whatever he was looking for in any of them. That was until a blonde barkeep in the Tar & Feathers (fifty if she was a day, _far_ too much make-up, and who simpered at Sherlock in a most unprofessional manner, I might add!) suggested that he try the Navigation Inn, which lay just under a mile north of the town where the main road to the west passed by. Sherlock indulged me with a carriage ride there, and after a short time inside he emerged looking triumphant.

“The case is closed!” he said firmly. “And it will give me great satisfaction, based on what I discovered about the family yesterday, to bring the perpetrators to book.”

“Perpetrators?” I asked. “More than one?”

“Two people were involved in this crime”, he said. “Come, let us fetch Sergeant Chevalier. I think that he in particular will be pleased with what I have discovered.”

In light of what happened next, Sherlock's statement proved truer than I could ever have realized.

+~+~+

There were seven of us in the dining-room at the Abbey Grange, as the setting sun gave the room a golden tinge. Lord Horsington sat at the head of the table, with his estate manager Mr. Furness on his right, and Doctor Storrington on his left. Father Abbot and Prior Richard were sat down one side of the table, and I sat opposite them. Sergeant Chevalier stood by the door, his huge presence a reassurance bearing in mind Sherlock – standing directly opposite our host – was about to accuse someone (or some two) of murder.

“This crime was most carefully thought out”, Sherlock began. “I find that impressive, considering that the whole thing was done in barely seven days. Because until approximately one week ago, our chief protagonist had no intention of committing murder, although he was already entertaining certain doubts about the victim, Mr. Alexander Hill.”

He turned to the sergeant.

“I am afraid that I told you a small lie before coming down this time”, he said. “There were two matters about this case which I wished to clarify; both involved some in-depth research and calling on my brother for help, which was why I needed an extra day. I was able to establish that the claims made in the letter that Lord Horsington received recently were, in fact, quite genuine. Mr. Alexander Hill was, in fact, Mr. Bruce Wanless, a wanted Australian felon, and almost certainly the man who murdered both the potential heirs to the Abbey Grange. He took the identity of one of them, as was claimed, to secure the Abbey Grange estate for himself.”

“I knew it!” Lord Horsington muttered. Sherlock turned to him.

“But you yourself were not strictly truthful, were you, my lord?” he said. “Even though you did entertain doubts about Mr. Hill's veracity, a mere _letter_ alleging him to be a liar would not have been enough to persuade someone like you. I spoke to your butler, and he told me that the 'letter' that you received at that time was in fact a substantial sheaf of documents. Whoever sent them to you included written proof that 'Mr. Hill' was an impostor. You omitted that fact; indeed, you attempted to mislead us by saying that you threw 'the letter' into the fire, implying a single sheet was all that you had received.”

“I did not wish to look more stupid that I already was”, the nobleman muttered, red-faced.

“Hmm”, Sherlock said, eying the nobleman curiously. “All right, let us consider what happened next. You are weak, sir, and you knew full well that if Mr. Hill found out that you were checking up on him..... well, accidents can happen, can they not? So you sought help. You went to Prior Richard in the confessional and you told him all.”

The prior looked disdainfully at Sherlock.

“As I am sure you are aware, sir”, he said starchily, “the seal of the confessional is sacred.”

“I do”, Sherlock said. “Religious orders are justly granted certain privileges so that they can function as they need, and that is all right and proper. But those privileges do not extend to murder.”

There was a stony silence in the room. Sherlock paused before continuing.

“The two of you hatched a plan, but as neither of you were medical experts, you decided to try it out first. Prior Richard knew that the cook ground up the sage before using it, so he himself ground up some belladonna and, on visiting the kitchen beforehand, placed it amongst the prepared sage to be used for his fellow brothers' evening meal. In that state, the belladonna would be undetectable amidst the sage. This meant that he could test to see the reaction to a dose of that size in relation to the size of the meal served. He also knew which brothers tended to be slightly greedier, then went off to the library for some 'research' and waited for what would unfold. Most fortunately, no-one died in this 'experiment'. Unfortunately the meddlesome local sergeant went and called in a renowned private detective from London. Suddenly, and not just because of Lord Horsington's ailing health, speed was of the essence.”

“You, my lord, waited a few days for the hue and cry to die down”, Sherlock went on. “then arranged for Prior Richard to come to bring your regular supply of herbs and spices. One of the bottles that he brought contained the same sage-infested belladonna that had poisoned the brothers the week before; most would think it just unlucky that that one bottle had evaded detection. And the belladonna in the bottle was not enough to kill a man, as with the brothers earlier. But there was more.”

He turned to the doctor. 

“Lord Horsington called on you, and said that a servant had dropped his bottle of heart-medicine”, he said. “Knowing how important that medicine was, you immediately provided him with a replacement.”

“Yes, I did”, the doctor said warily. “How did you know that?”

I suddenly saw it.

“Of course!” I blurted out. “Heart-medicine. The standard treatment for an irregular heartbeat is digitalis, the drug found in belladonna!”

“Indeed”, Sherlock said. “You, Lord Horsington, made sure that the digitalis from your not broken bottle was dispersed around your so-called cousin's meal, so that he would receive a fatal dose. There was nothing in the wine, and you ate a little of the potatoes, which had a very small dosage. Unfortunately for you, you were also greedy. You went to the Navigation Inn for a meal barely an hour before you ate, then claimed that you were still distracted by your confessional, so did not feel hungry.”

Lord Horsington dragged himself to his feet and stared down the table at my friend.

“I may have been caught”, he said, “but I shall die before justice can be done. And these lands will be restored to the Holy Mother Church despite _you_ , Mr. Sherlock Holmes!”

Sherlock smiled dangerously.

“I think not.”

“What do you mean?” Prior Richard demanded, also rising to his feet. 

Sherlock reached down for the small folder that was lying on the table in front of him, and extracted an official-looking document. He read from it.

“Certified Copy of an Entry of Marriage”, he quoted. “Mr. Jacob Ian Horsington, bachelor, to Miss Mabel Ann Lucas, spinster.”

The sergeant coughed heavily. Sherlock turned to him.

“When I saw you by that portrait, I knew at once that you were indeed of Lord Edwin's blood” he said. “Lord Horsington's cousin Jacob contracted a secret marriage in eighteen hundred and sixty-two, and _you_ were the result. She even had the idea of giving you a name to distantly claim your paternity, 'chevalier' being the French for 'horseman'.”

“You bastard!” Prior Richard exclaimed. “You lie!”

“You may see the documents”, Sherlock said airily. “All copies, so do not trouble yourself to destroy them.”

The sergeant pulled himself up to his full, impressive height.

“Prior, my lord” he said stonily. ”I am going to have to ask you both to accompany me to the police station.”

+~+~+

Lord Horsington was proven right about his evading justice, as he died just two days after the dramatic revelations at the Abbey Grange. Sergeant Wilberforce Rhynes Chevalier became the new Lord Horsington, and with three young boys of his own, the line was once more secured. Prior Richard had many years in an English jail to rue his part in a murder, and I suspect only the fact that he had not acted alone and the death of his accomplice led a jury to show some unmerited clemency and to spare his wretched neck. And Sherlock and I both laughed when, one month later, we received a photograph through the general post showing the new lord of the manor and his family, the sergeant still in the uniform of the post he had declined to surrender.

+~+~+

Next, from the House of God to an Act of God – or is it?


End file.
